Behind the Curtain: It felt like holding evidence

My Dear Friend,

Before I ever picked up a paintbrush, it was pens. I was obsessed with pens.  

In third grade, I had a pen pal at a neighboring school. We wrote to each other all year, back and forth, pages crossing between buildings like small, shy bridges. At the end of the year, we finally met. I remember standing there, holding all those words we had already shared, now suddenly attached to a real person. It felt like something in my imagination had taken shape. It was scary and exciting.

Around that same time, I started making books out of large butcher paper and a stapler for show and tell. I called them Miss Duck and her friends. There wasn’t just one, there was a whole series. I wrote them, illustrated them, carried them into class, and stood in front of everyone holding something that had only existed in my head days before.

They were all eventually included in the school library. Thrilling doesn't even begin to describe what that felt like. Each one had a little card tucked inside the brown paper bag cover, waiting to be stamped so someone could check them out and and take one home.

It was then, I understood, in a small way, the alchemy of it. How something ordinary, a blank page, a passing thought, could become something you could hold.

That instinct stayed with me.

Not much time passed and it took an even quieter form. I began writing letters to my grandmother. Not out of obligation because no one expected me to do it, but it came from a need to want to have a connection with one of the most important people in my life. This became a ritual for me, something I returned to again and again. I would sit down and write about my life as it was happening, the small things, the ordinary details, the pieces that don’t seem important until they are.

My uncle used to tell me how my grandma would walk to the mailbox, waiting for them. I’ve carried that image with me for years, even to this day. The waiting anticipation of something made just for you.

A couple of years ago, I was visiting him, and he said, “before you leave, I have something to give you.” He returned to the room with a box and handed it to me. 

“They are all the letters from you to your grandma.” Every one.

After I was able to adjust to the overwhelming moment of unexpected and emotional surprise I sat there and began to go through them, one by one. The envelopes were worn in that soft way paper gets when it’s been handled and kept. Each one marked with an address, and then another, and then another. All the places I had lived, all the versions of my life stacked together. Then there were the names. I couldn’t help but laugh. There they all were, every different last name, lined up in ink like a chaotic timeline. If you know, you know.

As I kept reading, something shifted.

What I was holding wasn’t just memory or nostalgia…it was evidence. It was evidence that she had kept them. It was evidence that these ordinary lined papers from my school binder were my words that mattered enough to be saved. It was a relationship that had been built, slowly and consistently over years.

All the moments I had written about, things that might have otherwise disappeared, had been transformed into something that remained. 

It was proof that I mattered, to her.

That is the true harbor: taking what is fleeting and giving it a place to stay.

I think that’s always been the thread in my work, whether I realized it or not. A desire to hold onto something, to make sense of it, to create something that can outlast the moment it came from.

Lately, I’ve felt that pull again, but in a way that asks for more intention from me and more slowness. Something that doesn’t live on a screen and doesn’t vanish with a swipe. Something you can keep.

So I followed that feeling back to where it started. I came up with the next chapter in my Art journey and of course I always take you with me. But this time I am thinking of each of you, personally. 

It’s called Mel’s Mail.

Each month, I’ll send a 5x7 giclee archival print, along with a letter from me. Each piece is created in that same spirit, meant to be held onto and over time, becomes its own record of where you’ve been and what you’ve carried. I will also include other small items from time to time. The first mail release includes something special. One row.

This will not replace my Newsletter. This is something different, more personal, not informational. A letter to keep.

For this first release the number of those who can join is 250 to keep it close, to make sure it feels as personal as the thing that inspired it. If I feel I can open it up to more for July, I will update. This is a new venture so I am still figuring it out. But the art for the first few months have already been created and will be waiting to head to your mailbox. 

The prints included in Mel’s Mail. will not be available on my website. They’re created specifically for this.

Sign ups will open May 13th (a newsletter with the link will be sent) and closes May 25th. The first mail will go out June 1st. 

This is a subscription offer that can be canceled anytime. 

If you’ve been here for a while, you probably understand why this matters to me.

Holding onto something small that carries more than it should… that’s what this is.

I am excited for this new chapter. 

So thankful you're here with me in this.

Much love and gratitude, 

xo,

p.s If this brought about someone in mind, what is something you would say to them now? I would love to hear. You can always write me back. I read every message.